"Did you literally have nothing better to do than just run after me?"
Tayuya was genuinely curious on one side, but on the other, she was just looking for a way to get rid of him in the long run.
Blondie, walking in front of her, scratched his head. "Well, not really, no."
"That's pathetic."
"Mean."
"Pathetic."
"MMMMEAN!"
Tayuya laughed. "Yeah, that's me."
He turned on his heel, continuing to walk backward to pout at her. "I'm not pathetic."
"You are," she chirped, stepping up to him. "And you know it."
He stopped, suddenly, and Tayuya almost ran right into him. "Am not.
"Oh really?" She smirked up at him. "Prove me wrong."
"Fine." He pouted like an upset child, turned around, and stalked ahead. "I'll show you!"
"Doubt it," she commented offhandedly, amused as it infuriated him even more. "Hey now, don't pout. Maybe you'll get to fuck me in the next town. That said..." She directed her eyes to the cloudy sky. "How far along are we?"
" 'bout halfway," Blondie said. "Though we could, you know, travel like actual ninjas and be at the coat in half a day."
"And where's the fun in that?"
"Uh, in arriving earlier?"
She rolled her eyes, a superior smirk on her lips. "As I said, pathetic."
"Am not!"
She sighed. "We're not doing that again."
"Are too!"
Okay, so maybe he was annoying. The idea of just killing him got juicier by the minute.
The town was a dump. Thugs littered the street, like the trash they were, and people slammed shutters closed the moment they walked by. Damn. What a nice place to be in.
"You know," she said, matching one of the uglier asshole's glare, "We could just travel like actual ninjas and be done with it."
Blondie gave her an incerdolous look.
"What? Had I known there was so much shit going on here, I would have skipped it. That means it's your fault."
"How is that my fault!?" he exclaimed, offhandedly backhanding a huge guy that had just attempted to tackle both of them to the ground. The thug had a ten-second flight as he sailed over half the village and hopefully died on impact.
"Well, you are my guide here," she said dismissively, kicking a pebble up from the road. Just as planned, it nailed the ugly bitch that tried to block her path right in the eye. Yowling in pain, the dirty shit fell over into the mud. Not dead, Tayuya noted.
"Oh, am I now?" She raised an eyebrow at him. He made a one-handed sign and a few copies of himself appeared with barely any smoke. "And here I thought you were trying to get rid of me."
Tayuya watched the clones disperse, overwhelming thugs and scum with no effort at all. "I am," she said, almost wincing as one of the clones broke some asshole's arm as he tried to punch some poor kid that ran into him. "You are just too damn hard to get rid of. I have to get some use out of you after all, don't I?"
He pouted at her. Behind him, a clone almost decapitated some dude with a hard backhand. Was it weird that it turned her on? "Oh yeah?" he huffed. "What about the sex, then?"
Hm. He had a point. "Hm, well, I guess that's one."
"I can cook!"
"So can I," she dismissed.
He raised an eyebrow at her. "For an infant child?"
That... uh, probably... not so much. "Alright, that, too." But wait. "How would you know?"
He gave her an almost haunted look. "Genin in Konoha do a lot of babysitting."
"Really?"
"Really. It's the most awful stuff, worse than the infiltration missions we had to do in Kumo." He shuddered visibly. "But nothing- NOTHING! - compared to... the demon cat."
Tayuya clicked her tongue. "Right." Damn. Konoha was even weirder than she thought it was.
"Thank god my summons are nicer than that... thing."
That caught her attention. "You're a summoner?" Wasn't the Hokage one, too? What was it again? Frogs?
"Cats."
She snorted. Right. Of course. What else? Better to let it rest. "So we're passing on this village? Didn't see an inn or something yet."
Loverboy shrugged. "I mean, the thugs are gone. And I know for a fact that there's a tavern at the south side. Been here before, you know? Been a while, though."
"Isn't that just you trying to get me into the next bed?"
He grinned cheekily at her. "Well, maybe. But it isn't like you didn't do it first."
She snorted. "Touché, I guess."
"That settles it!" he exclaimed, hooked his arm around hers and dragged her in the direction of the tavern.
She let him do it. Because he was such a good boy today. It would be a one-time thing.
... Maybe.
The smell of the sea on the wind sent Tayuya into an almost euphoric state. A childish giddiness she had once thought lost crawled through her veins and by the time they broke out of the forest to see the ocean down at the valley's coast, Tayuya was kind of bouncing. But only kind of, because she was a dignified, 25-year old woman, dammit!
"You really like the ocean, huh?"
"Shut up," she snapped at him, but the smile just wouldn't leave her lips.
It was beautiful. The waves glistening in the light of the setting sun as it vanished behind the horizon. Birds circled off in the distance and the sound - oh holy shit the sound - of waves crashing... It was fucking awesome. The best.
"So where you wanna stay the night?" Loverboy asked, leaning onto her shoulder.
She scowled, shoved him off her, and continued on down the path to the coast. "There's got to be some kind of shack around here."
He chuckled, catching up to her. "A lot less picky when it comes to the sea, are we?"
"I'm not picky," she huffed. "I picked you, didn't I?"
"Oi..."
Since it had been about three or so weeks it since she got him to... well, she would have liked to call it simply impregnated but. Well. He kind of fucked her to bits. The impregnation was only the extra. Anyways. Since it had been almost four weeks since then, Tayuya could check if she was actually pregnant with one of those neat - and at the same time disgusting - little sealing tags she got from Orochimaru before someone offed him.
What that fucker even had them for...
They were reasonably simple. Just slap them onto her abdomen - in reasonably close proximity to her womb - and activate it. A symbol would show up depending on the result. Easy.
Here's hoping that they weren't actually explosive tags... The one she tried out didn't exactly blow up but, uh, the stone she stuck it to tested positive sooooo, yeah. Maybe she should try out some more to make sure.
...
She could slap one on blondie. If it killed him, all the better for her.
Right?
Ugh, did it have to sound bad all of a sudden?
Yes, well, she had decided to see if he could maybe be the dad to his kid. So no killing him until then. Yeah. Perfect reasoning. Absolutely perfect.
Fuck. She was going soft. Was that a sign of pregnancy? It better fucking be!
"Sooo... we camping out tonight?" Blondie asked, almost startling her to death, "Don't see no shack around here."
She released a breath she didn't know she was holding. "Suppose so," she muttered, almost miffed when the ocean disappeared behind the trees again as their descent continued. "Good thing I've brought a tent."
"Same," he said with a grin.
"We sharing?"
His grin widened. "Yours or mine?"
She matched him despite herself. "Whichever is bigger."
"Obviously, mine is." He reached into his vest for some scrolls.
"Doubt it," she huffed, still smiling. Stopping in the middle of the path, Tayuya put her leg up on a fallen tree, just high enough to reveal most of her thigh, just shy of showing her crotch. Obviously, blondie had caught it the moment she stopped, his eye firmly fixed on her hands as she moved it up her tight. Slowly, languidly she reached under the hem of her tunic.
And triggered the small storage seal that was tattooed to the inside of her tight.
The moment the scroll fell into her hand, Tayuya put her leg down.
"You were saying?"
"Uhm, yours sounds... nice," he said lamely.
"Thought so."
Victory after victory. He was just so easy.
Or maybe he was making it easy for her.
She could easily deal with both, of she was perfectly honest with herself.
After that night she had to burn her tent. It reeked of sex and blondie. She hated that she liked it.
"Are we, like, going to walk over the water to an island?" he asked as they stood at the beach.
She didn't much listen, was busier with basking in the feeling of the sand between her toes and the water splashing at her calves.
"Or do you have a boat sealed away somewhere between those shapely legs?"
A snort tickled her nose as it escaped her involuntarily. "Eager to find out, huh?"
"Always," he answered immediately. "But seriously, are we gonna walk?"
She shrugged. "Suppose so. Not up for it?"
"Oh, I sure am. The question is, are you?" He squinted at the horizon. "That's a long-ass walk."
Tayuya yawned, stretching her hands as far over her head as she could. Her muscles and joints popped and jumped, the noise lost to the sound of the waves. "Mm. That's alright. You're gonna carry me, then."
"I am?"
"Sure you are," she said, grinning. "And you're gonna love it." She stepped onto the water. "Come on, I wanna get over yonder before I'm too fat."
"But wouldn't you be just pregnant?" he asked.
"Same difference."
And just as Loverboy had said, the walk was long. Fucking, awfully, stupidly long. And when the sun stood highest, there was no way she could walk in his shade. Simply dropping into the water from time to time helped but the salt, oh fuck her, the salt! Her skin and her hair were going to be a mess.
"Aaaaah," she sighed, doing her best to produce some shade with her cloak, "Don't you know some crazy-ass Jutsu to change the freakin' weather?"
Loverboy looked like the scorching sun didn't bother him one bit. In fact, he seemed even more energetic. It annoyed the hell right out of her.
"Uh, I guess?"
She stopped. "Wait, really? I was joking, for fuck's sake."
He shrugged. "I mean, those are, like... forbidden. And stuff."
She sighed. "Fucke me sideways..."
"Already did that," he quipped.
She stomped hard onto his foot, causing him to sink deep into the water and almost fall in face first. "You're a fucking moron."
"Who fucked you sidewa-"
She didn't let him finish this time, just pushed his head into the water as he still braced himself on his hands. "Shut the fuck up or you won't get to fuck anything on any conceivable side."
He came up with a big guffaw. "Mean!" he sputtered, floating there in the water like some bratty child.
"Well?" she asked, annoyed. "Can you do something about the freakin' sun?"
"I could," he said easily, floating on his back. "But I would have to call in some favors. And probably provided a lot of fish."
"Fish?"
"Mhm, for my summons."
Ah yes, the cats. Right, there was that. "And you can honestly summon a cat that could change the weather?"
Well, she'd take just about anything at this point.
"Yup. A fat cat." He frowned. "Don't tell anyone I said that." He sat up on the water's surface. "You know the saying "It's raining cats and dogs"? Well, the cat part might as well be true."
"That's stupid."
He shrugged. "A bit. It works though. A bit too well."
"Too well?" What could work too well about that?
"Might cause a tornado."
Ah.
"That would... suck."
He laughed. "It would, wouldn't it?"
"So... walking."
"Walking it is," he agreed.
When an island finally appeared on the horizon Tayuya had probably been sleeping on Loverboy's back for an hour or so. He woke her by way of pinching her ass. Miffed as she was, Tayuya bit his ear before she even opened her eyes.
"Lil' shit," she mumbled groggily, blinking the sleep out of her eyes.
"Mhm," he hummed, pinching her again. "The lil' shit that carried you across an ocean."
She smiled. "Yeah. You're a good lil' shit."
Then she pinched his ass.
He dropped her immediately.
A rude awakening. She made sure to shove him underwater three times on the last few kilometers to the island.
"The first thing we do," he complained, "Is take a damn shower."
"And fuck," she added, relishing the feel of solid ground under her feet.
"That too. Now..." He looked up and down the beach of the surprisingly green island. "Is this a populated island?"
Tayuya pulled her awfully crusty hair back into an ugly ass ponytail. "Hell if I know. Climb up some tree and look, I'll find some clean water." And by that she meant she was gonna use some basic water Jutsu to drain some plants dry and douse herself in some water spheres.
"Yes mam!" he mock-saluted before vanishing in a gust of wind.
Tayuya blinked at the spot. And just like that she had gotten rid of him. Had it always been that easy? Could she just have asked him to go fetch, like, the damn holy grail or some shit, and he would have just up and gone?
But then, who would carry her ass around? Yeah. She had to keep him for now. Surely.
Tayuya shook off the thought and scouted out her surroundings.
The island was pretty green. The forest was bright and dense with tall trees and a plethora of flowers. The beach was nothing but soft white sand with the odd boulder thrown in between. Something that Tayuya guessed might be a dead volcano rose high over the trees in the center of the island. And, uh, there was smoke rising somewhere at the foot of it.
So probably not unpopulated.
Tayuya was almost pissed. Having her own island would have been pretty fucking cool. But. BUT. So far from civilization, shit had to be done to get comfy. And Tayuya was a lazy person when she wanted to.
And Tayuya wanted to be lazy. And fat. Also pregnant, which was kind of the same thing.
The island was populated by some former merchants that had left the Land of Wind some years ago to set up a trading post out here. But because trade with the southern lands was slow, the post never outgrew it's initial size and turned more and more into a village over the decade or so it had been here.
Tayuya couldn't care less about it but Blondie insisted on talking to the village elder about it and get "permission" to live here.
Right. As if those old sacks of shit would have found them in the first place. Maybe heard, if she was feeling a little excited, but probably never found. Perimeter Genjutsus were easy to do, after all.
On the bright side, there was a small clinic here with some doctors that declared themselves to be happy to aid with her pregnancy however they could.
"So how are we gonna get ourselves a house?" she wondered aloud as they picked the market clean - buying everything sugary she could find.
"We could see if there's one in the village," Blondie answered, paying the old woman, who looked baffled by the number of sweets she had just sold to two people.
"Fuck that," she dismissed. "I'm not a people person. It's enough that I have to deal with you already."
"Feels more like I'm the one dealing with you, though," he muttered under his breath.
She narrowed her eyes. "What was that?"
He coughed. "Nothing, nothing. So, we gonna, uh, build ourselves a house?"
...
Tayuya stared at him.
Could he build a house? He didn't look competent enough. Strong enough, sure, but did she really want to live in a drafty shack? She wouldn't trust him to hammer a nail into the ground. The only thing she'd trust him to nail well was her, and sex was not going to replace a house. She had her priorities straight.
"H-Hey... What's that look for?"
She huffed. "You're pathetic."
"Where'd that come from!?"
Kushina was pretty satisfied with the outcome of her mission. It had been a political one, and she generally hated those, but on this particular one she got to scare the life out of the Iwa council. Kurotsuchi, as the newly minted Kage, had been holding in her laughter throughout the entire thing.
For a week straight.
She considered herself impressed.
"As expected from my savage host," the fox rumbled in her ear. "You take great pleasure in the fear of others."
She pulled a face. "I don't!" she insisted aloud. "Stupid."
"Do not lie to me, woman," the fox laughed. "I could feel your glee as they cowered before you. I felt it myself, too."
Dammit. The fleabag was rubbing off on her. Grandma Mito had warned her about that.
"Why do you assume I have fleas?" he wondered, "I am not corporal, woman. Mayhap your sadistic tendencies have finally rotted your feeble human brain away?"
"Shut it," she hissed back.
Damn fox. She was almost tempted to push him down with her chains but that would kinda be evil and she wasn't evil. No sir!
"Evil and sadistic are not the same thing, woman."
Her left eye twitched. The fox yelped as a chain wound itself around his muzzle. "Say something"?
He growled in response.
Ah. Blissful silence.
"Lady Kushina," one of the ANBU accompanying her spoke up, a messenger hawk on his arm, "The Hokage has announced a meeting."
Kushina frowned. A meeting? What for? And what'd he need her for that anyway? "We best hurry, then," she said, launching herself up into the trees.
The journey back home took just shy of two days. They arrived in the village in the dead of the night, but the meeting was assembled within minutes. Before Minato ushered everyone into the meeting room, Kushina pulled him aside.
"So what's this about?" she asked, taking his hand in hers. His palm was sweaty. A giveaway for his nervousness. She narrowed her eyes. "What's going on?"
He coughed nervously. "Uhm, yes, well... H-Have you seen Naruto recently?"
Kushina squeezed his hand. Hard. Her head tilted half an inch to the side and with dangerously narrowed eyes she asked. "What was that dear? I didn't quite catch that."
Minato whimpered.